Abstract

Several approaches have been developed to extend the dynamic range of image sensor in order to keep all the information content of natural scenes covering a very broad range of illumination. Digital CMOS image sensor are especially well suited to wide dynamic range imaging by implementing dual sampling, multiple exposure methods using either column or in pixel ADC, or Address Event Representation. A new architecture of digital high dynamic range CMOS image sensor, suitable for low voltage operation, has been developed that implements a built-in dynamic compression function targeted to LinLog behavior, by combining an event based readout of pixels, the use of multiple integrations per frame and the coding of pixel values using the mantissa-exponent principle, to achieve the dynamic range extension.